Saving Face
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics
Rated: R
Website: http://www.sonyclassics.com/savingface/
Release Date: 2005-07-01
Cast: Michelle Krusiec, Joan Chen, Jin Wang, Lynn Chen, Guang Lan Koh
Director: Alice Wu
Screenwriter: Alice Wu
Music Score: Anton Sanko
WorkNameSort: Saving Face
Our Rating: 4.00
The 2005 Florida Film Festival introduced local audiences to this cross-cultural dramedy, in which a Chinese-American surgeon (Michelle Krusiec) has to open her home to her middle-aged, newly pregnant mother (Joan Chen). Dating misadventures of the homo- and heterosexual varieties pepper a story that feels fresh mostly due to reasons of ethnicity – still, those are pretty good reasons, especially at a time when cinemagoing diversity mostly entails fielding invitations to an endless succession of big fat weddings. Krusiec’s enjoyable portrayal of a rigid overachiever provides an effective contrast with the chutzpah of her onscreen paramour, Lynn Chen. But the main object of the camera’s affection is star Joan Chen, who, after a disquieting early flirtation with eccentric caricature, completely inhabits the character of an old-world traditionalist pushed to her limit by extraordinary circumstances. Chen’s beleaguered Ma looks out at the modern Western world through eyes of quiet terror; with director/writer Alice Wu’s script as her guide, the actress demonstrates that such terror can be as funny as it is poignant.
This article appears in Jun 29 – Jul 5, 2005.